Reader comments

… and just suppose, as I have suggested here before (and was ‘thumbs downed’ for it) that this incident is a fiction … that the waitress made it up to jump on the bandwagon of a very similar story a couple of weeks before? I think we have to be VERY careful before we pre-judge this story.

I think there’s a more scientific way to discover what happened here. I’m not sure that a handwriting test would be conclusive.
There should be a record of all till use, assuming it’s a relatively modern system. They should be able to check whether a secondary receipt was printed for that transaction by looking at the logs files.
They should also be looking at CCTV for that period, to see whether the note was written at the table, or whether it was clear that the staff were doing this at the till after the fact.

Most decent businesses have a camera over the till. This is especially relevant when tips are involved.

According to what I have read, the couple have provided their copy of the receipt, and it clearly states an $18 tip. I believe they also showed a credit card statement displaying the purchase, which included the time and date and the inclusion of the $18 tip.

If they really did this, why would they then come forward like this to dispute the story? There is nothing in it for them to further this, unless they were genuinely upset that their visit was being used in this way.

Without knowing what system they use, it’s hard to say what happened. But, it seems to me that the only way this could have happened is if someone in charge of the till printed a second receipt and added this to it.

The customer has one showing the $18 tip and no bigoted comment, this means that it must have come from the restaurant or staff.

If this is the case, the person (or persons) responsible should be prosecuted and ordered to pay pack any money gained fraudulently from this.

America is a strange place when it comes to this. A lot of servers survive on tips, and the culture is for people to tip for service too, it’s more than just frowned upon if you don’t.

America was built on slavery, and they found it extremely hard to continue to grow after abolition. This is seen in many businesses where such low wages are considered acceptable, and in the US prison system too where millions are locked up for ridiculous reasons and forced to manufacture.

Nations grow on slavery, we (Britain) did it, Australia did it, several European countries did it, China is doing it…

It is a messed up system, but it got America the top spot, until China joined the international competition for leadership (again, using slavery). The US will not change any time soon, especially not now that there’s a coming conflict with China/Russia increasingly likely.

Politics and equality aside, you can’t force people to give tips to waitresses/waiters. It is terrible that people have these homophobic views but if giving tips is up to the discretion of the customer, I can’t see what the restaurant/authorities can do.

A customer could refuse to tip on the basis that theuy don’t like the shoes a waiter is wearing. This example reason is also stupid and disrespectful and ilogical but the customer has no obligation to give a tip – it is discretionary. Who would want money off people like this anyway. It is good that they are named and shamed though.

Peter B, you wrote, “It is good that they are named and shamed though.” We haven’t yet seen all the evidence. I have yet to come across a photo of the customers’ copy of the receipt and the transaction on their credit card account, Even these would not resolve the issue, as both items would be very easy to forge. The restaurant says that it will investigate the matter. It would be interesting to see the evidence of customers’ banker and of the restaurant’s EFTPOS service provider.

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